"My name is Camilla and I have been working in the cultural heritage field for the last 11 years. The love I feel for my hometown Bologna (Italy) brought me to work as a tourist guide with great satisfaction. My mission is now to reveal the real Italy. Together..."

Classical bologna tour

Description

Classical Bologna Walking tour:

Why is Bologna known as the red, the learned and the fat city? Find out by booking this half day tour (2,5 hours) tour!

Our itinerary:

1. Neptune’s square: here we can admire The Fountain of Neptune. The representation of the god Neptune follows at once several angles at the same time: the model was inspired by the human body in movement and the statue is permeated by a spiral-like motion, which seems to invite the viewer to look around it in order to grasp it in its full complexity. King Enzo’s Palace is next to the fountain: In this building, destined in the beginning to house the Town’s Council, King Enzo, son of Frederick II, was kept as prisoner until his death.

2. In Maggiore square we can visit many important buildings: Accursius’ Palace is actually a cluster of buildings: the original structures belonged to the family of Accursio, a Bolognese scholar who taught law at the university; the Basilica of San Petronio was built with the money of Bologna citizens. They wanted to have the biggest and the brightest church ever, but this church is known as the unfinished church, what went wrong? The imposing Banchi Palace, next to the basilica, is not really a palace but a facade. The architect Vignola, was commisioned to build the palace to hide the medieval market.

3. Archiginnasio Palace. Walking under the Pavaglione portico, there is the first single seat of the University. In 1561, to rekindle interest in Bologna’s university and house all of its activities under theroof, representatives of Roman Catholic Church ordered the construcion of the Archiginnasio.

4. The medieval market. Let’s find out what Palazzo dei Banchi is hiding: busy narrow alleyways of a market that with its gothic style still intrigue people from all over the world. In this district we can meet also the Marys Weeping. Seven life-size terracotta shapes in the corner chapel of the church of Santa Maria della Vita are the masterpiece of Niccolò dell’Arca.

5. The two towers. During the Middle Ages there were more than one hundred towers in the city. Bologna has been called the forest of stone.